


Torpe

by Fweeble



Category: Tokyo Ghoul
Genre: Asexuality, Day 7, F/M, M/M, Second person POV, Tokyo Ghoul Week, Unrequited Love, ace!Hide, incompatible orientation, pre-series supposition; semi canon compliant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-12
Updated: 2014-10-12
Packaged: 2018-02-20 21:53:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,898
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2444489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fweeble/pseuds/Fweeble
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You love him. You say it in everything you do. You never breathe a word.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Torpe

**Author's Note:**

> Hanged Man: anything you like/sacrifice, martyrdom, letting go, acceptance
> 
> Torpe: a man who is desperately in love with a woman, but cannot admit his feelings or approach her (OtherWordly on tumblr)
> 
> A/N: Thank you again, wisiaden, for nitpicking and making sure Hide's voice is in-character! All mistakes you still see are due to my own error. ; u;

You are both twelve when you notice.  
  
Kaneki has quietly become fascinated with the other gender. His eyes are always a little bit wider, a little rounder, when he sees a cute girl and the pretty flutter of her long lashes, the soft curve of her cheek. His gaze is steady and unwavering; he has not yet learned the finer nuances of the look-and-look-away courtship ritual that is the cornerstone of female-and-male awkward teenage flirting. He is fascinated, enthralled, and you watch on.  
  
The girls catch his gaze, pinken under it and duck their heads, whisper to each other furtively, and Kaneki flushes too. And as beautiful as the girls are, you’re far more attracted to the color that dusts the shell of Kaneki’s ears than the way dark hair spills over the girls’ shoulders when they tilt their head.

Everyone around you is changing and maybe that is normal. Soon, you will all ascend to middle school, you’ll be proper adults. Kaneki is just reaching that stage earlier than you. Someday, you too will discover what older boys find so mesmerizing about girls and it will be your turn to cast secretive glances at girls from across the hallway.

You try not to feel hurt, to feel robbed, each time Kaneki’s gaze is caught on something else, someone who is not you. It’s childish to want to monopolize the other boy this way, and while you acknowledge this, it doesn’t stop the hollow feeling that digs below your ribs when his attention is elsewhere. You want to cling to him, to demand he stop ignoring you, because you have had four years of only sharing him with books and now it feels like you’re sharing him with the entire world. It feels like an affront, an attack on you personally, and it’s stupid and it’s frustrating and it’s starting to show. Kaneki is starting to notice and you just  _refuse_  to be  _that friend_. That friend that ruins good things for others because they’re throwing a pity party for themselves, too wrapped up in their own issues to be happy for the people around them.

Instead, you strike a bargain with yourself.

Because you are being selfish and unfair, you won’t say a word. But in exchange for your good behavior, you will allow yourself to be just a little bit more childish until you learn to adjust.

So you cling to Kaneki just a little longer, mold yourself to his contours, all loose limbs and heavy weight, because soon, you may not be able to. Kaneki is becoming an adult and one day you won’t be the one he wants by his side.

\--

You are fifteen and a high school student.

The cherry blossoms have fallen long ago but you find yourself under the trees anyways.

She is pretty, soft auburn hair tucked daintily behind her ears. Her voice reminds you of birdsong and her eyes are the color of clear summer skies. She is smart and talented and you know at least four other boys with hopeless crushes on her and she has called you out, delicate flush on her high cheekbones.   
  
She likes you, she wants to date you.

You expect a rush of emotion, of excitement and attraction. You expect your heart to pound, to hear the rush of blood in your ears. What you anticipate are sweaty palms and your voice caught on the raw edges of feelings you could never express let alone define.

But your voice is calm, your pulse steady, when you reply.

There is no rush of endorphins when you hold her hand in yours for the first time, no skipped beat of your heart when you look into her beaming smile.

It will come. When you finally fall in love with her, you’ll feel it. You know you will.

\--

The world is white.

While the snow softens the sound of her crying it does not erase the blotchy red of her cheeks, does not make the shiny, wet trails of her tears disappear. Her tiny hands that you have held in your own so many times, always warm and welcoming, are clenched in tight fists as she rubs her eyes, as she tries and fails to hold back her sobs. You want to take her into your arms, to soothe away her tears, to apologize.

Tomorrow is Christmas Eve.

Tomorrow is Christmas Eve and you won’t be spending it with your girlfriend.

Tomorrow is Christmas Eve and, as always, you will be opening your home to Kaneki, to give him shelter from the hardship that is yet another cold, lonely Christmas in a house full of people who neither want nor accept him.

And she cries in front of you and while your heart aches for her, you feel no guilt. You know you’re doing the right thing, even as you envelope her in your arms and run gentle hands through her hair. Her sorrow soaks through your clothes, settle deep in your bones. You accept it all, her anger, her indignation. It is the least you can do.

You drop a final kiss in her hair.

This is the end.

\--  
  
  
Christmas Eve passes the same it always has. You have dinner with your parents and Kaneki, your mother constantly dropping food into Kaneki’s bowl, tutting over how skinny the other boy is. Your father discusses literature with Kaneki, laments over the illiterate of a son he has while you roll your eyes and show off your newly acquired English skills (which aren’t very impressive yet, but will be soon). Dinner ends with you and Kaneki under the kotatsu, elbowing each other for more room as you play Mario Kart. You spend more time driving off the road but Kaneki spends more time with your elbow up his nose.  
  
When it’s finally midnight and the two of you are properly high off Mario Kart induced adrenaline rushes and Christmas cake, you exchange presents. Your parents present Kaneki with a gorgeous leather bound notebook with crisp, unlined white paper and you present him with a fountain pen. Your father tells Kaneki that it’s for him to write down any story he has to tell. None of you say it’s for Kaneki to write down his story, a place to turn to when he feels he cannot turn to you.  
  
Your mother gets a gardening book for the tiny potted garden she has on the veranda and your father receives a portable go set. Kaneki presents you with new headphones, bright orange, and smiles tentatively, as if you would be displeased with anything he gave you.  
  
It’s nearing half past one when you finally retire. You roll out your spare futon and are digging through your closet for the spare blankets when Kaneki begins to speak, voice quiet and solemn.  
  
“I know, you know.”  
  
And you don’t know. You turn to look at him, nearly unbalance yourself on the stool you’re standing on in your confusion. “Know what?”  
  
“I just know.” Kaneki looks so crushed, as if he just admitted to murdering the royal family in his sleep. “You’re not… It’s Christmas Eve and you didn’t spend it with your girlfriend.”  
  
There isn’t anything to say to that so you don’t say anything until you find the blankets and spread them out on the futon.  
  
“It didn’t work out,” you say when the lights are out and Kaneki can’t see you. In the dark, where truth and lies can’t find you, only sleep and dreams. “It happens. It’s okay. We’re better off as friends.”  
  
Kaneki doesn’t say anything so you lean over the edge of your bed; wait for Kaneki to turn over, because he always sleeps on his back, always. You wait  until both your eyes adjust, for your eyes to meet, and carefully, softly, as if afraid your words will scare Kaneki, tell him: “Don’t beat yourself up over something that isn’t your fault. You’re my best friend, Kaneki. You’re always going to be important to me.”

\--  
  
  
Word spreads quickly that you’ve broken up and some of your friends decide to take it upon themselves to cheer you up. You are promptly kidnapped by the gang of thugs who call themselves your friends after school ends and Kaneki waves you away, amusement shining in his eyes.  
  
Someone has managed to procure cheap beer through morally questionable means and another person has squirreled hardcore porn lifted from his older brother. It’s a group of high school boys crowded around a television set, eyes staring intently at the tiny screen, terrible music the finishing touch on the scene of awful adolescent bonding.  
  
There is a lot of shifting and pillows and jackets discreetly placed over unusually active parts of male anatomy when of them pipes up. Everyone is just on the edge of tipsy when someone asks, “So how far did you get?”  
  
“We kissed.”  
  
“You dated for like five months and you’re saying you only got to first base. Lame.”  
  
The movie is completely uninteresting, the sounds unsettling and the images uncomfortable, the questions are irritating and prying, so you rip one pillow away from the person closest to you and hurl it at the asshole. “I’m a gentleman. One does not kiss and tell or say disparaging things about princesses and their chastity.”  
  
“You’re probably  _gay_ ,” one accuses. “Look at you. There’re hot chicks on the TV and you look bored to death. And you  _do_  hang out with that Kaneki guy way too much.”  
  
A chill shoots down your spine because  _what if they’re right_. You never initiated any of the kisses, never wanted more than your arms around her shoulders, fingers linked. What if you are...gay.  
  
You stand up abruptly and a few of them scramble after you, hands up. “Calm down, calm down. It’s just a joke, Nagachika.”And you stalk over to the guy, examine him intently and realize –you don’t know this guy. He isn’t from your middle school; you don’t share the same class as him. He has a prominent, slightly crooked nose, dark eyes and white, straight teeth.  _Not unattractive_ , you decide, and lean in for a kiss.  
  
You feel nothing besides the awkward and slightly uncomfortable sensation that is two boys with their lips haphazardly pressed together. There is no rush of excitement, no hitch in your breath, no stuttering heartbeat. Not gay, you decide.  
  
The boy looks terrified and confused, the entire room is silent, and you break into hysterical laughter. “That was gross, dude. Nope, decidedly not gay. That was the worst kiss I ever had.”  
  
Slowly, the nervous giggling starts, evolves into full-blown guffawing as everyone gives the boy jovial slaps on the back. “He got you! Nagachika got you good!”  
  
You wipe your mouth the back of your hand and say, “Man, got anything to drink? I think I need one.”

\--  
  
You don’t look at girls the way other boys do. You don’t look at boys the way girls do.  
  
You begin to realize you’re different.

\--

Kaneki, who is now well-versed in the fine art of coquettish flirting across the classroom, has his first crush at age sixteen.

Yoshikawa is beautiful, elegant, the star of the choir club. Her hair flutters behind her as if she generates her own wind; it trails after her like the line of admirers who follow her. She is talented and kind and gorgeous and it is no wonder she catches his attention. He sits quietly in his corner, sneaks glances in her direction throughout the lunch break. He never notices when you arrive now, and you hate being ignored, so you take to lightly thunking your lunchbox against his head, to throwing your arms around his neck and hanging off of him, to shaking him and demanding his attention.

“Stop ignoring me!” you always say. “I’m lonely when you don’t talk to me!”

And it’s not a lie even when Kaneki smiles at you the way an indulgent mother would at a petulant child.

Standing next to a Kaneki who doesn’t see you is the most lonely feeling and you hate it, you hate it so much, but he deserves happiness and that’s all you ever want for him. So when Yoshikawa passes the two of you in the hallway one day, you say just a shy too loud, “So you like Yoshikawa from class 2, huh?”

“Shhhhh, Hide! Not so loud!” Kaneki hisses, adorably red. “And I don’t like her that much.”

“She’s in the same class as you, right?” And you tilt the head up; make a show of combing through your memory for a specific, precious detail. “I hear she really likes this book. It’s from this one author? Sakatsuki? Akatsuki? Takatsuki? Something.”

Kaneki perks up, holds his chin in his left hand and asks, “Takatsuki Sen?”

“Yeah, that. I hear she likes it. Who would’ve known a girl like that likes things as dark as that.”

“I love Takatsuki Sen,” he breathes, looking over his shoulder, eyes staring intently at Yoshikawa’s retreating back.

“Do you?” you say, wondering why your heart  feels as if it carries the weight of the world. “I never knew,” you lie.

\--  
  
Yoshikawa doesn’t fall in love with Kaneki. She instead dates the star of the tennis team and Kaneki spends the rest of high school gazing mournfully at her. You spend the rest of high school trying to fix your mistake. You do everything in your power to keep Kaneki from wallowing, from dwelling too much on his first, unrequited love. Every book signing you learn of is a day reserved for the two of you. Kaneki gets his books signed while you browse the music section in the electronics store down the street and you have lunch together. Your heart always feels full when Kaneki turns to you beaming, a newly signed novel in his hands, and you think you understand why you were never good enough, could never be good enough, why your relationship was always doomed to fail.

“I’m applying to Kamii,” Kaneki says one day over sandwiches. “I’m taking their entrance exam next month.”

“I am too,” you reply.

\--

You feel confident that, in a room of one thousand people, you will be able to pick out Kaneki from the crowd on the first try, each and every time.

Only Kaneki.

\--

Kaneki falls for a mysterious woman in a coffee shop in your first year of university.

You go with him to the tiny coffee shop, heart in your throat, smile molded to your face. You discuss any topic that crosses your mind, anything to keep your mind from spinning uselessly in circles. The news talks about the recent murders –the binge eating ghoul that has been terrorizing the area and you try to shake off the unease you feel. Kaneki, who is always too wrapped up in the worlds he finds in printed words is the prime target of any murderer, predator or not. “You’d be eaten up in a second, Kaneki” you laugh even as your pulse races. You don’t know why you bring it up, just that the shadow of fear has left your heart in the darkness and you’re scrambling for reassurance any way you can get it. It’s a mistake, and you know it is, but you continue to dig your hole deeper with jokes and badly drawn doodles, anything to make Kaneki smile again.

“You know, Kaneki… Let’s talk about something besides ghouls.” You finally bite the bullet, crane your neck as you survey the shop, looking for the beauty who managed to capture Kaneki’s heart. “Is it her?” The girl is pretty, short dark hair with long, thick lashes that flutter like butterfly wings over her cheeks when she blinks. She has a quiet grace to her, her strides long and efficient for someone with as small a stature as she has.  
  
It turns out to be another woman.

Like Yoshikawa she is beautiful and refined, a lone lily in a field full of daisies and dandelions. She reads Takatsuki Sen and Kaneki looks so smitten you know there’s nothing you can say to deter him, even when her smiles raise the hairs on the back of your neck. “You’re kinda being  _that_  guy… it’s kinda creepy.”  
  
 _Be careful._  
  
You’ve had years to come to terms with your feelings and your role in Kaneki’s life.  
  
The spot by Kaneki Ken’s side is not yours.  
  
“Well, I got to see the girl you were talking about,” you say as you get up. “But I gotta go back to work now.”  
  
You smile even as you remind yourself not to be bitter.

\--

Unlike Yoshikawa, Kaneki does win the heart of this woman, Kamishiro Rize. Kaneki glows with happiness, is more animated than you have ever seen him when he speak of his dates with her, and you think that maybe everything is okay after all. This has always been what you wanted, right? Kaneki happy. Exuberant. Filled with life and love and wonder.

“Whatever, go and have fun!”

Because even if you do not belong by Kaneki’s side, you will always be on his side. You will always be there for him, a place to return to, a safe haven.

  
\--

  
You love him. You say it in everything you do. You never breathe a word.  
  
But maybe you should have.  



End file.
